(Last Updated on August 25, 2020 by Editor)
The parliamentary heist continues
- This is what’s been happening while your attention is drawn elsewhere. Thoko Khupe, who lost dismally against the MDC Alliance in 2018 is making her way to Parliament as a Party-list member to replace an MDC Alliance MP who was recalled by the MDC-T. The loser is making her way back to Parliament on the back of a party that she lost to in the election.
- Thoko Khupe is joined by other chancers who never having made an effort, never campaigned for the MDC Alliance for those seats; in fact having campaigned against the MDC Alliance at the last election and lost, are now ready to take those seats. And they will claim the title “Honourable”. These things only happen in Banana Republics.
- These seats are gifts from ZANU PF. The MDC-T never had a right to recall these MPs. The matter is not even settled by the courts. The party which submitted the party lists is the MDC Alliance. How ZEC allows a party (MDC-T) that did not submit the party-list in the first place is nonsensical. But it’s all choreographed stuff.
- The Electoral Law allows objections to be submitted within 14 days. This period started running from 21 August 2020. I don’t know if the MDC Alliance has sent objections or mobilised its members to do so. ZEC is institutionally biased so there is little hope but someone should register their objections, for the record. Sadly some of you will read this and say maybe someone will do it. As always, our people are used to outsourcing responsibility.
- This episode will go down in history as one of the most bizarre in Zimbabwe’s political history. This completes the heist against the opposition, clothed with the veneer of law, but a heist nonetheless. The regime raised its puppet party & handing it seats on a silver platter.
- But I think it would be irresponsible for the MDC Alliance to observe like disinterested parties as its seats are usurped in this manner. ZANU PF has taken away everything: MPs removed, HQ, funding & now seats. And you rely on the same system to win these things back? It can’t. Methods of engagement have to change. By Alex Magaisa